Moby Clique Read Online Free Page B

does Lindsay have to be so, well, embarrassing? “Nice shirt,” Parker says, but she clearly means the opposite.
    “Oh, thank th ! I’ve got a whole clo th et full,” Lindsay says, beaming. “I’m Lind th ay,” my sister says quickly, sticking out her hand for a shake. Parker gives it a disdainful look, but then decides to shake it.
    “I’m Parker,” she says. “Now, if you need anything, you let me know, okay, Lindsay?”
    “Um, okay, thank th, ” Lindsay says, nodding.
    “I mean it—I’m only here to help,” Parker says, venom dripping from her smile. “Any sister of Miranda’s…well, you know the rest. We’ll see you around.”
    Parker nods at us both and then retreats to her room across the hall, where I can hear her and her clone cackling. They think Lindsay is hilarious. Lindsay, meanwhile, is oblivious.
    “She’s nice,” Lindsay says. “And she has cool clothes.”
    “No, she’s evil and she has evil clothes,” I correct. “And you should stay away from her. Now, what’s the problem?”
    “You have any tampon th ? I’m all out,” Lindsay says at a volume not fit for discussions about feminine products. She’s so loud, in fact, that I hear Parker and her clone across the hall dissolve into another fit of snorts and giggles.
    Ms. P (as in Sylvia Plath), our dorm mother, the faculty member in charge of the girls’ upperclassman dorm, makes an appearance in the hall, just as Lindsay is rummaging through my suitcase.
    “Miranda Tate,” Ms. P calls, and then stalks with a purpose straight toward me. Her dark blond hair falls in ringlets at her shoulders and she’s wearing a plain brown skirt and white blouse. She’s also got her telltale red lipstick on and very little eye makeup. I’ve only seen Ms. P in passing on campus, and never had any of her classes, but she always struck me as one of the ghosts who didn’t like being stuck at Bard. Not that most of them enjoy purgatory, but some of them are resigned. Ms. P just seems sad. More than sad. Bitter.
    Not to mention, my advisor, Ms. W (Virginia Woolf), already warned me that not all the faculty like me. I have two strikes against me because a) I know the secret of Bard, as well as the location of the book vault, which holds the teachers/ghosts’ souls, and b) I’m a descendant of a fictional character from Wuthering Heights— Catherine Earnshaw’s now-lost twin daughter, Elizabeth. Since she left the book to marry my great-great-great-great grandfather, she’s no longer in any version you can read now. The faculty doesn’t trust fictionistas—people descended from fictional characters. Mainly because we have special powers, since we span both worlds. Last year, Emily Brontë tried to use me to open up the seam between this world and the fictional one. I didn’t want to help her, but among some faculty I’m to blame regardless.
    “Miranda—back for more punishment?” Ms. P says, putting her hands on her hips and stopping in front of my door.
    “Wow—I love that sweater,” Lindsay says, turning on her full brownnosing mode, the way she always does when in the presence of authority. “It really brings out the color of your eyes. And, oooh, is that cashmere?”
    Ms. P gives her a look that I would classify as almost warm. Granted, Ms. P isn’t smiling—she never smiles—but she’s not frowning, either. “It is, actually,” she says, then turns to me. “You realize that having an underclassman in this dorm violates Bard procedures.”
    “I know, Ms. P, but it’s my sister and she had a, well, a personal emergency,” I say, thinking that her whole life is just one big personal emergency. I mean, look at her. She has wrapped tampons sticking out of her jeans and she’s still trying to win brownie points. The girl has no shame.
    “I’m sorry, Miranda,” Ms. P says, crossing her arms. “I can’t allow any exceptions to the rules.”
    “But, Ms. P,” Hana starts, trying to defend me.
    “That’s enough, you